A Busy Day on the Farm & a Picnic on the Parkway

I finally found something to post with a specific subject! *is very happy* :D
Yesterday, Stacey came to pick up the horses. It all started out with him calling as we were finishing up breakfast, and Nathan and I had to rush up to the pasture to feed and get the horses ready. He was coming at nine, and it was already eight thirty. (It usually takes us about forty-five minutes to feed.) As soon as we got up there, I rushed into the tack room and grabbed the three halters, impatiently waiting for the horses to come so I could put them on my babies. Silkie came first, (as usual:) and I put her halter on. Then Red, then Belle. Filling the bowls as quickly as possible, I threw a pain pill for Red's knee into his food and we got them situated. As we were waiting, I went around to each stall as they chomped away at their grain and brushed them off quickly but thoroughly. Soon, the neighbor's dog started barking, and then Marshall; we heard a big truck coming. Yup. They were here. I walked out to the front gate to greet them as they pulled over to the side of the road, horse trailer and all.
"Hi! Um, the horses just started eating; do you think you could wait a few minutes?"
"Sure."
After they were done, we got them all loaded and heading down the road. Stacey was going to take Belle to the stables first, and then take Red and Silkie to another pasture close to his house. We were going to follow him to the pasture, but mom had to go down to the house and get the car. Stacey went on, and we were going to meet him at the stables. I waited up by the mailbox, sitting there in the grass and gazing at the empty pasture. It was weird. My horses were gone. It happened so fast. I knew that they would be very well taken care of, and it wasn't like I would never see them again, but, it was still weird. (To tell you the truth...I ALREADY missed them!)
Anyway, on with the story. We went on over to the stables, and Stacey let me take Belle to her stall and get her settled. She was very nervous, and when Silkie saw her leave the trailer, she began to whinny for her. We got her in the stall, and she kept on whinnying for Silkie and Red and walking around in circles. (There were no other horses in the barn.) After that, we left from there to take Silkie and Red to the other pasture. It's really close to Stacey's house, so I feel better. :) They began to eat grass immediately. It was a fairly big pasture with, in places, knee deep grass, and then a bunch of woods. Stacey asked if I and Andrew (Stacey's nephew) would like to take the horses down to the creek to show them the water. It was way in the woods, and when we got down there, we let them go. It was funny to watch them run around in the woods like wild horses. Silkie was having a ball, and wherever Red went, she went trotting along. They followed us all the way back up the path and into the field.

From there, we left and went to ANOTHER pasture to pick up the stallion, El Dorado, and take him to the stables. He is SO pretty! Andrew went out to call him and the other stallions, and he came running across the hill whinnying. They got him loaded, and we went back to the stable, unloaded him, and took him around the barn. Belle was in the barn at the far end, but as soon as El Dorado got to the entrance, he could smell her, and began to prance about and neigh. They put him in a stall about three down from Belle, and they both started to neigh at each other back and forth. Now in this picture, what they had to do was take ANOTHER gate and put it above the first one, securing it tightly. Why? The stallion will do ANYTHING to get to that mare. They'll jump over arena fences, or, in this case, this stall gate. He actually tried pushing it down. I took a video of him, and you can hear Belle neigh at him, and then he replies. Stacey said that this morning and again this afternoon he'll introduce the stallion and mare to see if Belle's in cycle. If she is, she'll be covered Monday. It was so much fun, and I can't wait to see them again! We're going to try and visit them twice a week; they'll end up being there for about a month or so.

To wrap up an exciting day, mom, Nathan and I planned to surprise daddy by going up to the Park Way with a picnic dinner. We didn't tell him where we were going, but packed everything in the car and mom got some KFC. We got up there and had a REALLY good time. It was very relaxing, and there was no one there. And...(here's my favorite part of the day,)....I took my first driving lesson. There was no one there, so dad and I got in the car and he let me drive around the loop. I was SO nervous...you wouldn't believe it. We drove up to the restroom, and then he made me back out of the parking lot. Joy. :) I told him after I got out, "I think I'm happy to stay a passenger for the next few years!" :D
I took a bunch of pictures, and then we went for a small hike up to the top of a hill close by. It was amazing to see some of God's most beautiful creation. Rebekah had her picture taken on a huge fallen log, but she wouldn't look up at me. Silly goose. :) We had a wonderful time, and we're hoping to do it every Friday or so.

Anyway, I guess I'd better close. Thanks for reading! :D

In Christ,
~Miss Rose

Of Rainy Days, Little Sisters, Frogs, Farms and Barn Life

If you haven't noticed already...I've been doing some pretty random posts lately. :) We've had a lot going on around here, and it's been kinda hard to think up of an actual post that has a specific subject line!
Anyway, on with the random post: once again, we're waiting for Stacey to come out and get the horses. He was supposed to be here this morning at nine. My brother and I waited at the barn...and waited...and waited again. It is now 2:11 PM. Ooooh well. I did get Red's mane braided and fixed up all nice. I took some picture while I was up there, and a video, too. In fact, I'm watching them download right now. :) This post is going to have lots of picture in it.
Now, you might be wondering about the "frog" part of the post. It all started Tuesday evening. Nathan, myself and our little sister Rebekah were all outside on the front porch waiting for everyone to arrive for Bible Study, and it was raining REALLY hard. We had the umbrellas ready. As we were sitting about waiting, we heard this strange noise. It was coming from the hostas right in front of us. Curious as to what it was, I ran out there real quick in the rain and waited for the noise again. There it was. Finally, we figured it out. It was a frog. Well, I was getting soaked, so I quickly moved some of theside and there he was, sitting there underneath them. I didn't have time to see him further, so we let him alone and continued our watch. The next day, which was yesterday, it was raining again late in the afternoon. Rebekah and I went out on the front porch, and I went to find the frog. The evening before I had picked him up once, and he croaked the whole time. It was really neat. Anyway, I got him out, and Rebekah and I just sat there on the porch and watched him. Now, as most of you know, Rebekah has Downsyndrom. It causes slow development and learning abilities, but Bekah, (as














we call her) learns much faster that most Downsyndrom children. (She's ten.) Well, I couldn't take picture and hold the frog at the same time, (who was trying to get out of my grasp,) so I gave her the camera. That was the best mistake in my life. :D We sat on the porch for almost forty minutes just taking a bunch of silly pictures. She took some, I took some. So I've decided to post some of them just for the fun of it. For your sakes, I'm only going to post the mild ones...some of our facial expressions got pretty crazy! :D





Yesterday, while I was waiting for Stacey to come, I took a bunch of pictures as well. On the way up to the pasture to feed the horses that morning, I took a bunch of the scenery and so on. Here they are. I really liked the ones of the horses grazing in the flowers. I was all the way up at the top of the hill and they were at the bottom, and I was surprised at how far my camera could zoom and give me good quality. Once again, up at the barn, I had a fun time taking a bunch of pictures. While I was in the tack room, I remembered that there was a mouse family living under one of our saddles, so I took my camera and snapped a couple of pictures. They turned out really cute! :) During the FOUR hours that I was up there waiting, Silkie lay down. I love it when one of the horses lie down...it's so cute! I was going to go over and pet her, but Red bullied her out of the stall before I could. All of my horses were being very lazy yesterday. It was hot and humid, and the barn was relatively cool compared to outside. I braided Red's hair and fixed him all up. He just sort of stood there and let me do it. That was fun.
Anyway, that's my very random post for the day. I apologize for not having a goal for my posts...hopefully that will change soon!




In Christ,
~Miss Rose

P.S. For you girls, I found a neat idea for your rooms or anywhere around the house: you can take a decorative bowl and find any sort of flowers you want, as long as they are cut almost to the flower itself and are small enough to fit in the bowl. In my case, I took rhododendron flowers. What you do is you fill the bowl up with water, not quite to the top, and sort of layer the flowers in there. It creates a really neat effect and looks lovely. Here is a picture of mine.
Enjoy!

Of Bathing Horses and Home-made Movies

On Friday, the farrier came out to shoe the horses. We went up to the barn and waited, and when he came, I held the horses while Nathan kept the others back. Red has had this scaly, scabby stuff on his forehead for a while now, and he keeps on loosing hair all over his body, even though he's far past the shedding process. As I was up at Red's head holding the halter, I began to look at it closely and sort of pick at it. Well, I took one of the pieces off, and there was this yucky, infected stuff underneath it. So I asked the farrier what it was, and he said that it's some sort of fungus or rainrot. He said that the best thing to do for it would be to give him a good bath with a special kind of shampoo....

Saturday, I went up to the barn and put Red's halter on. We were going to give him a bath in the front yard. Of course, I was looking forward to it...it's not every day that you get to see a horse in your front yard! :) Red is a good horse, and he let us do it without a struggle. We (mom and I) washed every inch of his body and soaped him up really good. He was SO clean and shiny! Well...you know what he did as soon as we took him back up to the pasture? Got down in the mud and rolled. Oh well...that's my horse for you! That evening, I found that Silkie and Belle had the same stuff on their backs. Once again. We washed the horses. Belle did pretty well, and you should have heard Silkie up in the pasture neighing for her. She was rather upset. When it was Silkie's turn, Belle was the one to get upset. She ran around the pasture neighing and kicking. Silkie was a bundle of nerves and would hardly stay still for two minutes straight, but we did get her done after a few nerve-wrecking moments.
And now for an update on Belle:
We didn't get her done last week. Stacey was supposed to pick her up Saturday, but that didn't work because we had to bathe the horses, so he was going to pick them up that evening. Something came up and he didn't show. So. Here I sit at the computer desk, and in my room bluejeans and work shirt on my bed JUST encase he comes. :D

Also, on Friday, my brother and I decided to go down the road from our house to Amos road, a little gravel road with lots of woods around it. I'm sure we were quite a sight: Nathan in his full blown army get-up, gun slung over shoulder and helmet cocked at an angle on his head, and me with a tape recorder, two cameras, and holding Nathan's mask. Yup. We were off to film a short movie. We set up in a thick area of pines, and I held the tape recorder with the camera balancing on it. We were gone for two and a half hours and ended up with eleven minutes of movie. All in all, it was really good. This is the "cover" for the short movie:

If you would like to see it, go to Nathan's blog HERE. (This is me holding Nathan's gun. He took the picture right when I turned to see if a car was coming.:)








And, for a little fun, I've decided to put a short video of Silkie. I was up at the barn, and she was very sleepy. Just thought I'd put it up! :)



Well, I know that this post hasn't been very exciting, but, I just needed to do one. Thanks for bearing with me! :)

In Christ,
~Miss Rose